Raven Klaasen and Rajeev Ram produced a clinical performance to defeat home favorite Jamie Murray and his partner Bruno Soares 6-1 6-4 to reach the final in London.
The South African- American combination pounced on a flat start from their opponents and broke twice in games four and six to seal the first set 6-1. The pair won 13 out of 16 first service points en route to annihilating Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares in the opening set. The number one team in the world for 2016 had it all to do in the second set.
Klaasen and Ram continued their momentum in the second set as they broke in the very first game to carry on their efficient start to the match. However there is a reason why Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares have won two grand slams as a team this season and have ended the year as the best team in the world, this proved evident as they broke in the sixth game to level the second set at 3-3. However Klaasen and Ram wasn’t going to let this match slip easily and as a result of their determination they broke straight back for a 4-3 lead. Klaasen and Ram continued their aggressive, smart style of play and served out the match successfully to complete a 6-1 6-4 victory to reach their sixth final of 2016. Here are the match stats from the match:
Analysis
Raven Klaasen and especially Rajeev Ram were effective and efficient on serve. They broke four times, which means they were opportunistic and their base level of play was at a high percentage. This was important as Murray and Soares have played brilliantly all season and needed to play a perfect tennis match and they achieved that successfully. For Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares it was a dissapointing end to what has been an exceptional season, they started flat and did not improve since the start of the match. However they can be proud of what they have accomplished this season and will hope to build on that next season.
Tomorrow’s final will see Henri Kontinen and John Peers take on Raven Klaasen and Rajeev Ram, the teams have met twice which Kontinen and Peers lead 3-0. The final will take place at 3.30pm local time.
Extraordinary Year
Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares have had an exceptional year, and after their straight sets loss to Raven Klaasen and Rajeev Ram, they had a ceremony to celebrate their achievement of becoming the year end world number one as a team. Here is the transcript from Jamie Murray and Bruno Soares expressing their emotions about their loss today and becoming the year end team world number one’s:
Q. Jamie, obviously goes without saying you’ll be
very disappointed with that. What didn’t work
today that’s been working so well?
JAMIE MURRAY: Well, I think the guys just zoned. It
can happen. I think we didn’t do a terrible job, we
just got kind of steamrolled, which can happen in
doubles.
Yeah, it just happens sometimes that the guys play a
great match. You know, they hit some great returns
in important moments. They were pretty sharp
around the net. We probably missed a couple shots
kind of at wrong times that kind of didn’t help our
cause.
Yeah, just played a lot better than we did. Fair play to
them.
Q. We’ve talked about the No. 1 ranking. Having
got that yesterday, now the year is over, can you
actually start to look back on it historically,
highlights, the things that you really did well?
JAMIE MURRAY: Well, yeah, I mean, winning,
obviously the tournaments we won were highlights
for us. To win in Australia and the US Open were
huge achievements. We both came into the
partnership not having won a Grand Slam, both
being in finals before. And to get two in the first year
is a great achievement.
I think, yeah, we can be really proud of our efforts
this year. It’s not easy to make a partnership work, I
think. We did a great job. I think we got on great the
whole time. We worked hard for each other, tried to
improve ourselves and as a team.
I think we got lots to look forward to next year.
Q. Jamie, slightly odd to get the trophy when
you’re disappointed with how the match went.
JAMIE MURRAY: Yeah, it’s a weird feeling. It’s just
life, isn’t it? We lost, but they did a nice presentation. We can be happy with our efforts this year, I think.
Q. When you’ve got to the top, where do you go
from there? How do you kick on and reset goals?
JAMIE MURRAY: I mean, I think we can still improve
a lot in our game. I think we have the last few
months.
Yeah, the more we play together, the better we’ll get,
I think. I mean, it wasn’t like we won every single
tournament. We obviously won a lot of matches but
we lost a lot. I think there’s things we can improve.
We’re both aware of that.
That’s exciting for us, as well. There’s still a lot we
can do better. Hopefully next year we’re sitting here
again in the same spot in the rankings.
Q. Jamie, I guess you would have had to follow
Andy’s match to a certain extent given that you
were playing after. How much did you watch of it
and how hard is it to go out and play yourself?
JAMIE MURRAY: We watched the last set. We didn’t
have anything else to do. We were just waiting for
them to finish.
It was stressful. I’m sure everyone watching it was
finding it pretty tense. Obviously not an easy
situation to watch, then have to go on court to play.
It’s not the first time that’s happened. Just tough to
have to deal with it.
It was obviously great that he won. Gives himself a
chance in the final tomorrow.
Q. Bruno, can you comment on the
disappointment of today’s result, but the
compensation about finishing the year at No. 1 as
a team.
BRUNO SOARES: Well, I think it’s amazing. The fact
that we lost today doesn’t take anything away from
us, everything that we achieved throughout the whole
year.
It’s worse to get an award after you lose a match, but
we knew that could happen. But we had an amazing
year, a very special year for both of us. We won two
slams. We did a lot of right things.
But like Jamie said, we both know we have a lot to
improve. I mean, I think we work hard, we put a lot of
effort in our team. For us, I mean, it’s a lot of rewards
this year for everything we did. We had another great tournament here, great run.
It’s tough. I mean, we played 20 something
tournaments. We won three titles. All the others, we
finished the tournament with a loss. It’s part of our
sport.
Pretty happy with everything that happened this year.
Q. I guess the two of you now go your different
ways. Jamie, you’re off to Wimbledon. Bruno,
you’re back to Brazil. How does a team that lives
so separately prepare for the new season?
JAMIE MURRAY: Well, yeah, we just do our own offseason.
I’m sure we’ll speak with our team now, kind
of have a few goals that we want to get through in the
off-season, you know, individually obviously, because
that’s how we’ll be doing it. When we come back in
January, we link up again, we’ll be ready for the new
year.
Q. Where will you link up?
JAMIE MURRAY: Doha. We’re going to play Doha.
Q. How long will you take off and when will you
start training again?
JAMIE MURRAY: I don’t know. Maybe 10 days,
couple weeks maybe. I mean, it’s not long. It’s kind
of getting towards the end of November, and the
tournament starts the first week of January. If you
want to do a good pre-season, that probably takes
two, three weeks of your time.
Obviously it comes round fast. But, yeah, put the feet
up for a few days, get away from the tennis court,
reflect on a great year, then get back to work.
BRUNO SOARES: Reflect on a great year (smiling).
